My Doggie and I by R. M. Ballantyne (free e books to read .TXT) 📖

that I could not refrain from observing that he did not seem to be particularly ill.

“Ain’t I though?” he remarked, elongating his round rosy face as much as possible. “That’s ’cause you judge too much by appearances. It ain’t my body that’s wrong—it’s my spirit. That’s wot’s the matter with me. If you only saw the inside o’ my mind you’d be astonished.”

“I thoroughly believe you,” said I, laughing. “And do you really advise him to go, granny?”

“Yes, my dear, I do,” replied Mrs Willis, in her sweet, though feeble tones. “You’ve no idea how he’s been slaving and working about me. I have strongly advised him to go, and, you know, good Mrs Jones will take his place. She’s as kind to me as a daughter.”

The mention of the word daughter set the poor creature meditating on her great loss. She sighed deeply, and turned her poor old eyes on me with a yearning, inquiring look. I was accustomed to the look by this time, and having no good news to give her, had latterly got into a way of taking no notice of it. That night, however, my heart felt so sore for her that I could not refrain from speaking.

“Ah! dear granny,” said I, laying my hand gently on her wrist, “would that I had any news to give you, but I have none—at least not at present. But you must not despair. I have failed up to this time, it is true, although my inquiries have been frequent, and carefully conducted; but you know, such a search takes a long time, and—and London is a large place.”

The unfinished muffin dropped from the old woman’s hand, and she turned with a deep sigh to the window, where the blank prospect was a not inapt reflection of her own blank despair.

“Never more!” she said, “never more!”

“Hope thou in God, for thou shalt yet praise Him, who is the health of thy countenance, and thy God,” was all that I could say in reply. Then I turned to the boy, who sat with his eyes cast down as if in deep thought, and engaged him in conversation on other subjects, by way of diverting the old woman’s mind from the painful theme.

When I rose to go, Slidder said he would call Mrs Jones to mount guard, and give me a convoy home.

No sooner were we in the street than he seized my hand, and, in a voice of unusual earnestness, said—

“I’ve got on ’er tracks!”

“Whose tracks? What do you mean?”

“On Edie’s, to be sure—Edie Willis.”

Talking eagerly and fast, as we walked along, little Slidder told me how he had first been put on the scent by his old friend and fellow-waif, the Slogger. That juvenile burglar, chancing to meet with Slidder, entertained him with a relation of some of his adventures. Among others, he mentioned having, many months before, been out one afternoon with a certain Mr Brassey, rambling about the streets with an eye to any chance business that might turn up, when they observed a young and very pretty girl looking in at various shop windows. She was obviously a lady, but her dress showed that she was very poor. Her manner and colour seemed to imply that she was fresh from the country. The two thieves at once resolved to fleece her. Brassey advised the Slogger “to come the soft dodge over her,” and entice her, if possible, into a neighbouring court. The Slogger, agreeing, immediately ran and placed himself on a doorstep which the girl was about to pass. Then he covered his face with his hands, and began to groan dismally, while Mr Brassey, with native politeness, retired from the scene. The girl, having an unsuspicious nature, and a tender heart, believed the tale of woe which the boy unfolded, and went with him to see “his poor mother,” who had just fallen down in a fit, and was dying at that moment for want of physic and some one to attend to her. She suggested, indeed, that the Slogger should run to the nearest chemist, but the Slogger said it would be of no use, and might be too late. Would she just run round an’ see her? The girl acted on the spur of the moment. In her exuberant sympathy she hurried down an alley, round a corner, under an archway, and walked straight into the lion’s den!

There Mr Brassey, the lion, promptly introduced himself, and requested the loan of her purse and watch! The poor girl at once understood her position, and turned to fly, but a powerful hand on her arm prevented her. Then she tried to shriek, but a powerful hand on her mouth prevented that also. Then she fainted. Not wishing to be found in an awkward position, Mr Brassey and the Slogger searched her pockets hastily, and, finding nothing therein, retired precipitately from the scene, taking her little dog with them. As they did so the young girl recovered, sprang wildly up, and rushing back through the court and alley, dashed into the main thoroughfare. The two thieves saw her attempt to cross, saw a cab-horse knock her down, saw a crowd rush to the spot and then saw no more, owing to pressing engagements requiring their immediate presence elsewhere.

“There—that’s wot the Slogger told me,” said little Slidder, with flushed cheeks and excited looks, “an’ I made him give me an exact description o’ the gal, which was a facsimilar o’ the pictur’ painted o’ Miss Edie Willis by her own grandmother—as like as two black cats.”

“This is interesting, very interesting, my boy,” said I, stopping and looking at the pavement; “but I fear that it leaves us no clew with which to prosecute the search.”

“Of course it don’t,” rejoined Robin, with one of his knowing looks; “but do you think I’d go an aggrawate myself about the thing if I ’adn’t more to say than that?”

“Well, what more have you to say?”

“Just this, that ever since my talk wi’ the Slogger I’ve bin making wery partikler inquiries at all the chemists and hospitals round about where he said the accident happened, an’ I’ve diskivered one hospital where I ’appens to know the porter, an’ I got him to inwestigate, an’ he found there was a case of a young gal run over on the wery day this happened. She got feverish, he says, an’ didn’t know what she was sayin’ for months, an’ nobody come to inquire arter her, an when she began to git well she sent to Vitechapel to inquire for ’er grandmother, but ’er grandmother was gone, nobody knowed where. Then the young gal got wuss, then she got better, and then she left, sayin’ she’d go back to ’er old ’ome in York, for she was sure the old lady must have returned there. So that’s the reason w’y I’m goin’ to recruit my ’ealth in the north, d’ye see? But before I go wouldn’t it be better that you should make some inwestigations at the hospital?”

I heartily agreed to this, and went without delay to the hospital, where, however, no new light was thrown on the subject. On the contrary, I found, what Slidder had neglected to ascertain, that the name of the girl in question was not Edie Willis, but Eva Bright, a circumstance which troubled me much, and inclined me to believe that we had got on a false scent; but when I reflected on the other circumstances of the case I still felt hopeful. The day of Edie’s disappearance tallied exactly with the date of the robbing of the girl by Brassey and the Slogger. Her personal appearance, too, as described by the Slogger, corresponded exactly with the description given of her granddaughter by Mrs Willis; and, above all, the sending of a messenger from the hospital by the girl to inquire for her “grandmother, Mrs Willis,” were proofs too strong to be set aside by the mystery of the name.

In these circumstances I also resolved to take a holiday, and join Robin Slidder in his trip to York.